El-P

I was gonna be out of the loop for some time as to not spoil myself and be able to watch the stuff I can't watch now later. Then I'm reading news on Liberation, like and do everyday and this : https://www.liberation.fr/international/amerique/etats-unis-accuse-dagressions-sexuelles-le-boss-du-catch-demissionne-20240127_J3CP43QT7FBZ7C7AGUBU3SD6QI/ When you've got an article on Libé (and really, it's on every major news outlet, Le Monde, L'Equipe), you not under the radar anymore. I wonder if the fact it became TKO actually made it more visible. In which case, oh, the irony. Fucking finally. I have not red the details yet, and from reading the thread's reaction I'm not sure I want to, as I don't deal very well this stuff like this. Guilty by way of silence. The guys closest to Vince can't say they did not know about who he was. It's the same as Gérard Depardieu in France. The French cinema industry knew. But "Oh, it's Gérard !"... This. There need to be a clean up. A real, deep one. There probably won't be.

That's also another one way to look at it. I realized that Royal Rumble 1999 was a quarter a century ago today. That's 25 years since me stopping being a WWF (then) fan. I was appalled by the Rock vs Foley match. I was appalled by the focus on Vince (ya know, winning the Rumble and all). 25 years later, I totally pre-shot that shit. The Foley match remains one of the most horrific and wrong in mainstream pro-wrestling, and Vince was a complete piece of trash. 25 years... Enjoy the Rumble, people. Or don't.

Mauro would be an improvement over jack and shit.

I don't remember Santana & Ortiz not being used before Santana got badly injured. I dunno. They sure weren't in any memorable stuff for a while apart from the awesome street fight with Best Friends. Well, one would not even talk to the other apparently, even when they had to work this match together on Rampage. Ortiz has tons of charisma, can be funny, he'll be allright if they use him alongside other people. Santana. As a single, unless he totally reinvent himself, I don't see it. He's a good worker, but he's one good worker out of a sea of good workers, and there's nothing really specific about him. They sure seem to have totally forgot about him, after he won his match with Ortiz no less. They were the hype of the late 2010's on the indies and such, but time flies.

He fucking did a shout out to them when he won the Rumble. Last year he stated in an interview that they were still in contact fairly regularly, and that they were bonded for life. Crazy to think that people might be friends, and that not everything fits people's fantasy narrative.

Netflix : "Love is sharing a password" Also Netflix : "Hey, you people are cheating us, you can't share passwords no more !" Also, they don't pay taxes like they should (yeah, that covers a whole lot of companies). Fuck ya, Netflix. Then again, all big streaming service are awful, really. Choosing one is having to choose the lesser evil, just like with music. Fuck you too Spotify, by the way, you're an awful company.

I just picture Rock powerwalking backstage up to Cody's locker room and give him the "That finishing the story stuff, doesn't work for me brutha." while Lesveque is shrugging in the background. Watcha gonna do when Netflix runs wild ?

Mauro's announcing is god awful. Yeah, sign him for 20 years on Netflix, please.

He's been with TNA since 2014. Hell, 2011 considering Ring Ka King. And he's never been any good. So yeah, he's a job guy, because at this point that's all he can be. I'm actually amazed he's still employed, really, he must be real good friends with someone. He's basically just as poor now as he was 10 years ago when he started as a regular. Barely improved at all.

WWE is all about nepokids now. Orton, Cody, Charlotte, Dominik, Ava... Roman. And it's only gonna get worse with time, especially now that pro-wrestlers date each others, marry each others and have kids together. It's gonna be a big-ass incestuous bourgeois family in no time. It is hilarious though. Like, maybe a little more subtlety ? A little LESS obvious ?

While at it, gotta say this, and that has nothing to do with WWE at all : I always though Netflix was kind of a shitty service. Shitty interface, übershitty search device, shitty mentality to boot.

'member when Mike Santana basically threw away a great tag-team because he thought he could be a single star, got a few vignettes and a match on Rampage against the guy who he would barely talk to ? Where he is now, while Ortiz just main evented Collision against Danielson & Claudio, tagging with his friend Eddie Kingston ? Funny thing is, when you looked at LAX, as they were called, Ortiz always was the most charismatic of the two. If anyone would break out, it would have been him.

I'm sure glad I did not spoil myself, because I did not expect Will Ospreay to put over Josh Alexander. That really meant something for him, because he did not need to do this at all. Awesome match, of course.

Okada is working in NJPW until February something. He ain't appearing at the Rumble. And no, there's NO justification for Okada to be in NXT. NONE. It would be a complete joke. He's the biggest japanese star of the last 15 years. He's one of the greatest wrestler ever. The Idea that WWE is so damn specific that someone like him would have to spend some time in NXT is completely ridiculous.

Okada in NXT would be a complete joke and the sign that nothing has changed. Jade Cargill would debut in the main roster (or not, whatever happened to whatever hype she ever had), but Kazuchika motherfucking Okada would go to NXT ? This would be so fucking pathetic.

I was thinking more than the other way around. Things don't stay hot forever. Usually it's a matter of a few years. Cyclical and all. 3 years ago, WWE was not hot, as the Hulkster would have said. They better be hot in 2030, because if they aren't, Netflix is gonna cancel their ass like nobody's business. And then, yeah, what you said too.

As the buddhist saying goes, there's no way to know if any event will end up being bad or good.

Ok, so 5 years. Netflix is basically Cancelmania. 20 years ? That's Bret Hart in 96 contract ludicrous right there. Things go way too fucking fast to be engaged for 20 years anywhere.

Yep, a funny flex kavana.

"What goes around comes around". Julie Hart. Montreal. 1997

Top 5 ever. 10 years though. Who knows what the media landscape will be in 5 years. Does that mean AEW will try to sell themselves to Amazon Prime or something ? This certainly is super intriguing in term of the evolution of the business, on many aspects.

The Streaming Era. 10 years is a long-ass time.

I put it there although it's really not the right thread for it but.... The Rock is now part of the board of directors of TKO. Can you smell what he's cooking ?

Or rather when he's in there where he can't afford to act like an asshole because he's not in position of supposed power. Let's be real, WWE doesn't need CM Punk at all. It's just a bunch of bonus ratings point for them, and the satisfaction of sticking it to AEW, from their point of view (which is highly debatable, all things considered). They were hot as fuck without him, if he leaves, they don't even blink. He has exactly zero pull over there right now. And it's not like WWE would be afraid of Punk going back to AEW either. Cody speaking the truth in that promo was insanely ironic too. It's like he was actually dropping a pipe bomb, but without any gimmick needed. And you know he actually means it too, since he's friends with the Bucks still.

To me it's less the match itself (which will infact be whatever, most probably) than the fact it is happening. Call it the old WAR Randomizer effect, if you will.